Fans cheer in Game 7 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles during the first half, when the Warriors never trailed.

Photo: Michael Macor, The Chronicle

Fans cheer in Game 7 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles during...

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Warriors head coach Mark Jackson during a timeout in the first half. The Golden State Warriors played the Los Angeles Clippers at Staples Center in Los Angeles, Calif., in Game 7 of the Western Conference first round playoffs on Saturday, May 3, 2014.

A Golden State Warriors fan shows support during the first half of Game 7 of a first-round NBA basketball playoff series against Los Angeles Clippers, Saturday, May 3, 2014, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu)

Los Angeles -- - Blame it on Donald Sterling, or on what's her name. Blame it on dysfunction within the Warriors' leadership. Blame it on the refs, the smog, a misalignment of the stars of Hollywood and Vine.

But after all the blaming, it will be time to face reality. The Warriors have been bounced out of the playoffs after seven thrilling games, and really, you can lay the blame squarely on the Clippers. In the end, the Clips overcame a wretched owner and a plucky, overachieving group of Warriors, and they're on their way to Oklahoma City.

The Warriors' dreams are just another sand castle washed away by the relentless Pacific Ocean.

It was a weird series, featuring an intriguing and incredibly grimy soap opera filled with villains, but in the end it was all decided on the hardwood, not in the sleazy muck of Beverly Hills.

This will always be remembered as the Sterling Series, and that sordid tale did blot out the sun for several days. The Clippers were shaken. I stood at two separate news conferences and watched Doc Rivers, one of the great leaders in sports, well up with tears over the ugliness of his team owner's actions.

But the players on both teams had time to shake off the shock and pain. And make no mistake, the Warriors had to wade through the same yucky muck, listening to demands and pleas from high places that they boycott.

To call the psychic toll anything but a push would be unfair to both teams. In the end, forget the tragedy and psychology, it all came down to basketball, and the Clippers played that game better than the Warriors. Five points better, 126-121.

Mark Jackson told us a million times, "This is a no-excuse team," and so it is that the Warriors won't whine off into the Malibu sunset. They'll walk off with heads high, underdogs who ran the big guys ragged, but didn't have quite enough.

Both teams rose to the occasion, rose above the ugliness and what Jackson called "the sideline music," and played a hell of a series. The Clippers played a tiny bit better.

For the Warriors, it's the end, but it's also the beginning. Now starts what is assured to be a lively and even maniacal offseason, the team facing the biggest crisis of the Joe Lacob and Peter Guber and Mark Jackson Era.

Remember when life was much simpler? The Warriors had fun, lost games, missed the playoffs, hired new coaches, wallowed in mediocrity, and nobody really noticed.

Losing is easy. Winning is hard. In this case, winning and then losing in the end, is going to go down really hard.

No matter how gallantly the Warriors played in the seven-game series, no matter how they rallied around their coach, they lost a game and series they could have won, and now it's time for Lacob and Jackson to tap gloves and come out fighting.

"Mark did a fantastic job," said Jermaine O'Neal, the team's elder statesman. "He's a fantastic coach, and he'll be a fantastic coach, whether it's here or somewhere else."

O'Neal also gave what you rarely hear, a nod to Lacob, under whom the team has thrived.

"We got an ownership group, led by Joe and Peter, and they'll do what's best for the team," O'Neal said.

To be very clear, the main issue, the bone of contention between Lacob and Jackson, is Jackson's assistant coach. Lacob, who considers himself a knowledgeable hoops guy, believes the Warriors lost too many winnable games this season by being outcoached.

Lacob appreciates the rock-solid we-are-family team vibe Jackson has cultivated, but wants more. He wants Jackson to hire a lead assistant who is a whiz with X's and O's, who can draw up killer plays in the huddle with two seconds left in the game.

That's why Lacob hired Michael Malone and then Darren "The Wire" Erman, hires to which Jackson gave his grudging consent. Both those guys are now gone. Lacob wants a new genius. Jackson says who needs genius when you've got love, respect and a group of guys who will run through walls for their coach?

"Find a top second-banana," Lacob urges Jackson, who digs in his heels and insists on keeping Pete Myers as his chief bench sidekick. For all that Myers offers, he's not the kind of guy Lacob wants.

Is Lacob being unrealistic? Were these Warriors really a regular-season 56-win team? Or did they simply lose some close games because they're not the Miami Heat?

If one argues that Jackson is a strategy lightweight, it's worth noting that the series turned in the Warriors' favor when Jackson shuffled the deck, moving Draymond Green into the starting lineup. Jackson made the move with a slight nudge from Jermaine O'Neal, who volunteered to grab some pine, meat. O'Neal was showing the kind of team-first attitude that has been a trademark of the Jackson Era.

The Jackson Era: Just beginning, or don't let the door hit you in the rear?